Mudazumo Naki Kaikaku: The Legend of Koizumi

In this 3 episode OVA (it still says its ongoing but there is no release date for the next dvd), the world's prominent figureheads battle it out in a furious high stakes battle of...

...MAHJONG!

Yes in this universe, every figure head is a master Mahjong player and all the worlds politics are dealt by playing a game of mahjong. The first episode is entirely based on the manga while the other 2 episodes are original stories written by creator, Hideki Ohwada. Forget Hetalia Axis Powers, this is how political satire should be.

There are no cute looking bishounen characters running around here. In this anime every figurehead ... is drawn in a fairly accurate anime depiction of themselves. Because we all know satire is funnier when it's more 'realistic'. Anyone can make a sports anime (go, cards, koi koi, basketball, etc) but it takes a genius to make take such a silly idea and just run with it. If you can't laugh at how Kim Jong, GW Bush, etc then its apparent that you have no soul. This type of comedy made me reminiscent of shows like Monty Python's Flying Circus. The characters are what makes this show 24 minutes of nonstop political laughs.

I say 24 minutes since it is a 3 episode OVA and yes each episode is about 8 minutes long. The short time gives it a perfect amount of time to keep the hilarity at high octane. One of my favorite moments is that they gave Kim Jong's oldest son, Jong-nam, donned Mickey Mouse ears because he's famously known for sneaking into Japan just so he can go to Disneyland. There are many other jokes such as these that are very subtle yet insanely funny if you are fairly up to date with current events. Now if you're not up to date on things like this, I highly recommend reading up on this titles Wiki page first that will make sense out of what you are watching since translator notes are minimal.

The Legend of Koizumi is definitely worth your time. Even if you care about current events or not, its only 24 minutes long. Everyone should watch as many Short OVA's as possible.

A lot of OVA based on manga don't do very much character set-up, and instead just drop you right in, assuming you're already familiar with the manga and it's characters.

The Legend of Koizumi is no stranger to this, and does very little set-up for it's cast of characters. Despite the fact that they're all political figures, the lack of very much introduction is very jarring.

The story is also very jarring, as it simply jumps from one scenario to the next, trying to squeeze as much as possible out of each episode's 8-minute runtime. This seems unnecessary, especially considering each story doesn't actually have very much ... of interest going on, and they all follow the same basic formula of "Koizumi gets into a match of mahjong with a political leader and pulls off some great play". Perhaps these stories would be more interesting to me if I understood the rules of mahjong, but since the writer doesn't do anything to explain the rules, I don't have that context, so the stories simply fall flat to me.

There also isn't much comedy to be had here. The funniest part would likely be how they paint George W. Bush as being a child, but that's simply one good joke out of a 27-minute runtime. The rest of the humor is supposed to come from flashy sequences that are supposed to be so over-the-top that it ends up being ridiculous, but this didn't actually work very well for me, so the presentation just ended up feeling somewhat lackluster.

That's not to say the art is bad, as it's very nicely done, with great character design befitting the political setting, and smooth, detailed animation as one would expect from an OVA. However, the art can't save the poor directing and pacing.

The sound design is also very well done, feeling loud & powerful at key moments, and the voice actors also do a nice job with their characters. The soundtrack is perhaps a bit generic and forgettable, and while the ending theme is catchy, I doubt it will stick with me for very long.

Still, despite these good aspects, the lack of congruity or interesting aspects in the story make this no more than simply a fun romp through a crazy world. It's a somewhat enjoyable watch, that has a handful of flaws and overall manages to feel somewhat tepid and uninteresting in terms of it's story, despite it's over-the-top, ridiculous nature.

I'm not sure if this is a political satire or political propaganda, but it's one of the funniest things I've ever seen. If was laughing until tears entered my eyes during the whole thing.
The whole thing is just one ridiculously over-the-top. It parodies other sports/game anime by how dramatized the moves are and the political figures all have funny caricatures to them. Also, Mao Zedong rises from the dead to play a game of mahjong. What more could you ask for?
The entire anime is 26 minutes. So, if you want a quick watch and laugh, this is the show. If you feel your time has ... been wasted, you only invested less than half an hour. I say it's worth the chance.
Just go into this show not expecting anything serious because it sure doesn't take itself seriously.